Canyontalia: Clear as Crystal
by Vysria
Summary: How can you prevent teenage kids with swapped minds from wreaking havoc and causing chaos? You can't. Especially not if they're of opposite genders.


Crystal yawned and rolled over in her bed. Was today part of the holidays or something? She hadn't gotten this good of a sleep since Thanksgiving break, and school was called prison by her classmates for good reason.

Blinking blearily, she wondered why the room was a pale cream color instead of the light dawn shade (basically pink, but she'd made the analogy long ago when being called "girly" was a concern to her) she was used to. She groaned a little bit, and forced herself to sit up.

The first thing she noticed was that a clump of hair (that usually consisted of poorly cut bangs) did not fall in front of her face. Something tickled the nape of her neck, and on instinct she scratched at it, finding the tips of short hair.

Her parents disliked anything "improper", which included girls with hair cut above their shoulders. They obviously weren't the culprit here. None of her friends knew where she lived, so it wasn't some weird prank. Did it magically cut itself? She then dismissed the thought of nargles or wrackspurts. She wasn't a Lovegood.

She began to examine the rest of herself, mentally noting that the room was hot and stuffy. That shouldn't have been possible. It was winter, and the low temperatures for the night was under 32 degrees (Fahrenheit, for all you non-Americans). At best it should have been at a comfortable 70. And why was it so humid?

All she wore on top was a tank top, which would have been reasonable had she originally been planning to sleep in this environment. However, she clearly remembered that she wore a fleece pullover to bed over her tank top (as stated above, it was winter). What?

Something was off, if it wasn't already painfully obvious. Then, something snapped into place.

What happened to her chest?

Alright, so she wasn't as stacked as most other girls her age, but by no means was she flat-chested. So… why was her body…

Throwing off the sheets (another inconsistency – she had a comforter), she made her way over to the full-length mirror that was located next to her bedroom door, when she remembered that it wasn't her room.

This room looked a bit larger than her own. A desk, with a large computer monitor (she suspected that it was actually a TV monitor being used as a computer screen) was positioned next to a window, much like hers. That was about the only thing that was similar.

The desk itself had an overhead shelf (filled with computer games) and drawers to the right (probably filled with consoles and writing utensils). It was clean and well-kept, unlike the art-supply crammed surface of hers that made it near impossible to do any homework in her room.

On the floor underneath the window, there was a large inflatable duck (why?) and a panda with the character 香 on its forehead. Was that panda... alive? She blinked.

The panda blinked back at her.

She shrugged, and set off on her mission to find a bathroom with a proper mirror. Come to think of it, a shower did sound nice…

* * *

Crystal stared at her reflection in the mirror.

Her reflection stared back.

In a sense, her reflection was technically a "he", but it was so weird to think of herself as a boy. It just didn't sit with her.

What she saw was a messy haired Chinese teenage boy. His slightly gravity-defying bangs were swept above his left eye, but other than that, the rest of his hair was tangled, and part of it were sticking straight up. Well. At least he still looked good with mussed-up hair. Or would that be me who looks good? she wondered. Did having the same body constitute as having the same "being"? Whatever. Too early in the morning for that.

The boy (herself? Himself?) did seem to look like a certain character from somewhere… Hong Kong from Hetalia, was it? But that couldn't be possible. For one, science didn't discover a way for minds to switch bodies yet. (Unless they had and were hiding secrets from the public for fear of causing the government to seem like a futuristic cruel dystopian society, but let's set that aside for now.) Second, Hong Kong was a character from Japanese animation… unless everything in that show was true and nation personifications actually did exist and were kept secret by the government.

An adventure. Yay.

After a quick shower (short hair really was easier to manage than long hair) and a change of clothes (male or not, she wasn't quite comfortable with such a loose, open top), she set out to find something to eat. What, it wasn't her body that she was putting calories into.

* * *

And here she thought only her parents didn't use spoons for cereal.

Sitting at the kitchen table was a young man – a rather feminine looking young man at that – trying to swallow not-quite-soaked cereal and milk from a bowl with blue oriental designs on it. It only served to further her opinion of "my Chinese family is weird".

Remembering that her own body was that of an anime character's, she tried to bring forth all she knew about Hetalia (which, sadly, was not that much). Um… side ponytail, Chinese, traditional Chinese clothing (that was a bit crumpled up, as though he'd slept in it). This person must be… wait for it… China.

No, really. But Hong Kong lived with China, so… um… how does one act like Hong Kong again? Eye twitching internally, she carefully schooled her features into those of neutrality (it was normally quite hard for her to do that… perhaps it was muscle memory?), and asked, "China, what are you doing?"

China stopped mid-action and frowned. "Um… you just called me China, right?" This was China? Did China act like that in real life? She'd just play along for the time being. Maybe she could at least get some information.

"What else am I supposed to call you?" she scoffed, folding her arms across her chest. Wait, was that too much of a girl pose for Hong Kong? Oh, whatever.

Shock showed in China's eyes, and Crystal panicked again, wondering if she wasn't playing Hong Kong's character accurately. That proved not to be the case, however.

"Like, maybe Alice or something? I'm a girl, you know?!" Alice? But… Alice was her classmate, back at home. No way she was here, in China's body… like how Crystal was in Hong Kong's… she filed away these thoughts to dwell on another time. By then, "China" had already started talking again.

"… aru… Ah!I must really be getting old! I am getting so confused with myself, heh heh…" Really? Alice, is that all you can do? Well, it was pretty funny to see "China" so flustered, so the charade continued.

"Um… I guess you, like, had too much to drink or something so you got confused." Wow, it really wasn't that hard to talk like Hong Kong (who spoke like a teenage boy). Speech tic and an unamused tone of voice.

"Yeah! That must be what happened! Russia must have forced me to drink some of his vodka or something… aru." It was a good thing that Hong Kong didn't really know Russia, otherwise she might have gone and asked him why they had gone "drinking". Though if it had turned out to be true (which she highly, highly doubted), then… well, she wouldn't do anything about it, would she. Laziness. It's a major factor during the twenty-first century.

"I see you're still a little… how should I put it… _hung over_ or something…" she commented. China/Alice did look kinda like the aftermath of a hangover. Irritation (before she'd dropped the shock bomb on him/her), crumpled clothes, and still-kinda-knotted-but-at-least-I-tried-to-fix-it hair. Okay. Game still on.

"China" quickly (and loudly) stammered an excuse and ran upstairs, leaving Crystal alone in the kitchen. Wait, let's not forget the cereal (that had finally become soggy).

She walked over to the fridge, grabbed a piece of bread, and went to her… Hong Kong's?... room. No need for unnecessary luxuries. (What, wheat bread is healthy.)

* * *

She was developing an uneasy love of explosions.

When the cooks burnt something, she'd come running down before she knew it (muscle memory?) and felt strangely elated when the metal pot blew up.

Yeah. Serves them right for not using woks.

So, seeing as she had nothing else she could do (video games could only satisfy her for so long), she tried to find Hong Kong's missing firecrackers.

It was December. One month until the Lunar New Year, and you couldn't have those without red firecrackers. Not to mention the Western New Years which needed fireworks.

Except, you know, they'd all gone missing.

Maybe China took them. Protective-big brother figure and all, maybe? Except for the fact that it wasn't quite China in that body, she suspected.

The shouts of _"What the_–! Wha– Why do I look like _China_?!" added to that growing suspicion.

She let the shouts continue for a while longer (because honestly, how could you not find "China" being excited about having a male body and having wanted to "be a boy" for however long amusing) then realized that the servants (maids?) were getting curious as to what was happening.

"Will you, like, shut up in there? I'm trying to concentrate on finding, like, my firecrackers or something!" It wasn't a blatant lie, at least.

A loud apology sounded from the room, followed by some not-so-quite rambling. Crystal, giving up on the search for dangerous explosives, began to explore the parts of the building that she hadn't already.

The "house" was more accurately described as a "mansion", but nations could afford to be luxurious. Servants/maids (her Cantonese wasn't that good, so her internal translator was a bit off at times) took care of the building for its occupants (did Macau live here too?), though at the moment that number seemed to consist of only China and Hong Kong. Seemed. As previously noted, she hadn't quite explored the whole house yet.

In the back, there was a large yard, decorated in an Oriental fashion (this is China's house we're talking about here, dearies), complete with a small open-air pagoda tea-house thing (she blamed American education for this) and a pond. After having found the garden, she climbed into Hong Kong's room through the window. It wasn't as hard as she thought it'd be, but a Nation's (more like District) strength coupled with kung fu training gave you some pretty powerful muscles.

The panda stared at her as she jumped into the room over it, watching as she dusted off her clothes, smoothing out any wrinkles that had developed from her little expedition. Noticing the panda, she wordlessly picked it up and clutched it to her chest, the warmth from the little animal seeping into her body.

Today was quite a day, but what would she do when actual problems arose?

* * *

A/N: Alright, so here is an OC story (the likes of which I have not attempted to do since my Vivi-Undetermined Camper days), and I was slightly hesitant to write it – mostly for fear that my character would be shallow and two dimensional and just, well, unappealing to the general reader.

My friend convinced me to write this with her, so here I am, giving this a shot.

This story is part of a series called "Canyontalia", as noted in the title, links will be posted on my profile.

Please let us know if you would like us to continue! ^^


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